Un amour de Swann

So I admit I've been reading other books - good books. I'm not ashamed. What? Did you expect me to remain faithful? Was Odette faithful? Was Swann? Was anyone? No.

It's been rough going.... slow. Must go.... ....on....
"To think that I've wasted years of my life, that I've longed to die, that I've experienced my greatest love, for a woman who didn't appeal to me, who wasn't even my type."

I can't help but say that I know exactly how he feels. Not just with women but with all of my enterprises, to think that I've wasted all this energy - two months of perfectly good reading time, created an amazing blog for a book that doesn't really ever appeal to me which isn't even my type.... (sometimes I wish I were reading more Waugh, Greene or LeCarre and blogging about it) I must soldier on - I have taken a personal vow and I must finish what I have begun. I shall begin Nom de pays : le nom and then tackle the next challenge: À l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs.

For anyone who has been in one of these relationships as Swann's or anyone who has known someone close to them who was in one of these things, this was excruciating to read - many a nerve was hit (except for the whole class apparatus issue). I just wanted to forcibly take Swann and get him out of there.
But I really love dear Uncle Adolphe - I mean you send this guy to help you out and he can't help but try to seduce the very woman you're trying to get with. I want to read lots more about this guy. I really hope he pops up throughout. Please Proust!

Proust in Greece

Like Gregory, I was plodding. The distracted self! In an effort to keep up and abreast of the challenge, I took "Swann's Way" with me on my recent trip to Greece. It was an interesting experience. I find that reading while traveling--in motion to an elsewhere that is unfamiliar--I experience a book simultaneously with the physical journey and the two become inseparable and linked in my memory. To do this with Proust was ironic and extremely pleasurable. I spent time in Greece as a child, and I often found myself on some street in Athens inhaling a sudden smell that jolted me back to a lost childhood memory and the sensation of vertigo of mind, the reliving of a moment, the physical supplication to memory that Proust captures and returns to again and again in "Swann's Way". There is great pleasure in experiencing a book like this, especially in Greece (human/cultural mecca) where time and millenniums are so elusive.

I am surprised to find the novel so amusing. I laugh all the time while reading it, not in any particular section, all the time. The awkwardness and angst of first love, unrequited love, bad love--I suppose I am laughing with Proust. Although engaging, I felt great relief at the end of "Swann in Love". Not hopeful (poor Swann, poor Odette!), but relieved. "To think that I wasted years of my life, that I wanted to die, that I felt my deepest love, for a woman who did not appeal to me, who was not my type!" Ah Proust.

Slow Progress Dogs Proust Blogger

Yes, I know. This is exactly what you said would happen. I am going very, very slow - everything is a distraction from what I should be focusing on - Marcel, Marcel, Marcel. I just finished the Combray sections of Swann's Way - the tender walks down Guermantes Way and the Meseglise Way through space and time. The incident with Swann's beautiful daughter Gilberte has a certain resonance (for everyone?) which brings up all sorts of memories of how terrible and embarrassed one can feel when he's in love. Especially in youth (but not in youth too) when it's all so terribly awkward. (but do we know how young our narrator is? how old are these memories?? does anyone know?) . The narrator seems adept at spying - it almost seems more a literary tool so that the author can maintain the first person memories and still go into the third person omniscient. Could he really successfully spy on the Venteuils so well over so much time? I guess it's not so crazy - he has a spy's knack for remembering an insane number of details from long periods of time. It makes me wonder how Proust would have fared if he were in the espionage biz. hmmmm......

I am excited to begin the meat and potatoes of Swann's Way: Swann in Love. At this point I really hope it goes well for poor Swann - I could use that right now to get my back in to sorts.